Julia Creek is, as we know, without a Bank. The loss of a banking facility is a blow to any community and Julia Creek is no different. Council has been negotiating with a number of banks since before the exit of the Credit Union and these talks are ongoing and will continue. Most Banks though don’t think that we have enough people - and so your help is now needed though to help us build our business case that trumps their population case.
We have set our sights on something better than what we had before. We want someone who has a good and competitive agribusiness product for our grazier - we want someone who has a quality business and personal product for residents in Julia Creek itself - and we want someone who has a layer of other quailty financial product for everyone right across the Shire of McKinlay. This does affect us all.
Banking has changed in lots of ways in recent times and many people now only need internet banking and the occasional face to face meeting with their Bank Manager to operate their business. Many businesses however still have to handle daily cash transactions, and these same businesses provide cash for individuals, the community and shire sporting events. Many people including our seniors, as well as community groups also need and prefer a banking facility to handle and hold their cash locally. Good Banks today also offer much much more by way of a wide range of other services that still need a sit down face to face sales pitch.
Most banks are telling us we don’t have enough people and they are looking at much bigger communities. This is probably a fair call from their point of view but from ours they are only looking at numbers and not looking at the total amount of business that could be theirs if they came to the Shire with the right products and we all supported them in every or any way we could. We need to show them the amount of business in either deposits or loans that could be theirs if they came to Town with the right product that would make us change from where we currently bank. We also want the community to benefit from their whole range of other products, and to set up a financial advisory service, even on a quarterly basis so that residents can get good financial advice, close to home.
A few of them have good, nationally award winning products that we are sometimes not even aware of. The flyers often go into the bin. We miss their ads because we rush out during the cricket or the tennis to do something else or get another beer. The glossy brochures are often written in bankers terms and so sit at the bottom of the big pile on the desk. And so we all miss out in some way in making our money work just that bit better for us, or our loans, or our insurance, or our superannuation - and the list goes on. Enough is enough, the odd add or two in the hope that we see it doesn’t do it any more, we want them to come to this Shire and sell us the best they have if they are up to it.
We are now going to survey the whole shire community to see what business everyone might be willing to transfer, or offer in the way of new business to a Bank, if we can find the right one, and a reputable one with the right product. The Survey will be confidential and will not ask for any names or addresses so please indicate how much existing business you might be willing to transfer to the right Bank by way of the number of accounts, loans, deposits and how much that might mean in dollar terms. Please also indicate if you are considering borrowing money in the next two years or so and how much that might mean as well.
Please do not indicate in any way who you are or where you live, and these surveys will be placed in plain envelopes and eventually opened and tallied up by an appointed third party. Basically if we can indicate that there is up to $5m in deposits, and up to $10m in new or existing loans available to them if they come, then we have a far better case than what we have now. Council will of course transfer its substantial deposits and daily business across to any Bank which comes to the shire.
This does affect us all, and the stability of Julia Creek so I appeal to everyone, whether you live on a property or in a Town, or whether all you need is internet banking or not, to please support the building of this business model to help get a Bank back to the McKinlay Shire.
Paul Woodhouse
Mayor
